Customer is Tired of this PARASITIC DRAW!! (Toyota Avalon) 

I have a 92 Camry/Lexus in my "fleet"that is still solid after thirty years and over 375,000 miles."Grossly over - engineered" according to Edmund's

The Japanese vehicles about forty years ago caused American manufacturers to step up their game.

This car was made in Kentucky and is more of a domestic car than most big 3 equivalents. Avalons are great and most Toyotas are well made but I have to say that they can all be a major pain in the ass to work on. "The Toyota will fuck you" is a common phrase at my shop.

@@JPAutoService try a Honda..the worst

They don't call them "baby Lexus" for nothing. Mine is a gem.

009⁹⁹990000000

Too bad 17 yrs is considered their life span! I still drive a 92 Tercel that works great! no frill's but VERY cheap to drive.

@@garyalford9394 Planed obsolescence. Everything must last less and less, for the profit of manufacturers. In the EU, annual inspections and increasingly stringent legislation, have the main purpose of making older cars too expensive to pass.

😂

You need to bypass him with a permanent jumper

yes, unfortunately radios are supposed to have some sort of memory in order to keep settings saved. I had to do this on a 16 Chrysler 300 because the radio was consuming a lot of power. I tapped into the cigar wire to activate a relay on accessory but quickly learned that the radio would not recognize the car in accessory mode, only in the run "full power mode" and of course that loads all electrical so, that would be the only downfall when doing this type of modification. For newer cars, it is hard to find power on accessory modes as most modules are full power and ground and are on standby, what makes them up is com lines which sucks if you are trying to tap into an ignition wire, there is no such thing in these newer cars, not even at the push to start button, it is always constant power and ground, the com lines is what sends out the signals, it is crazy.

I did the same on my 03 transit connect, i wired an ign live activated relay to the dash live, i lost trip and time memory on the dash but thankfully kept the radio presets 👍

@@scientist100 Yes I knew a older fellow who installed snow plows etc on trucks who quit doing it because he said the newer vehicle electronics have got to hard to deal with!

Dear Abby might have a few words for your girlfriend...cheap is good.

@@haroldwilkes6608 frugal is good, cheap is not

Hey Eric! Thanks for the comment man! I figured if the radio turns on in ACC then if the draw came back it would be the radio... But only came back after an ON cycle so must be the fancy-pants multi display 😉

Do you mean Brake Kleen? Oh, wait that’s SMA. My bad.

Sma, pine hollow, scanner danner, diagnose Dan and etcg are all the best RU-vid has to offer.

@@Ismail-1983 south main auto repair

@@PineHollowAutoDiagnostics Since that was an always hot power feed that kept the radio presets. I wonder if the emissions monitors also reset now since the fuse also feed part of the ecu?

Short pin

That's nice design

Radio just spewing out garbage anyway. 😂

If you ever get up to the Bay Area I could fix it for you.

next time? he's never been to Los Angeles

ScannerDanner gives 5 mins of worthy information in 45 mins, wastes too much time.

@@akhtarkh the opposite is Keith DeFazio... Gives 45 minutes of information in 5 minutes 👌🤣

@@PineHollowAutoDiagnostics now I can't argue with Ivan. I concur.

Interesting

Neat!

Thank you for that info. My 2001 avalon has the correct date as long as i dont forget what year it is. HaHa. Thanks again.

Great tip!

Nice!

Search for "fuse tap adapter" will bring in the part mentioned. And add some additional elegance. Building a nice house for the mouse.

An Add-A-Circuit would definitely be the right solution here. This would allow you to maintain the existing cigarette lighter fuse while adding an additional dedicated fuse to the patched-over circuit to the cluster. It would also avoid the soldered fuse kludge.

Seeing as the customer opted to have the "cheap & dirty" fix (just terminology from my days as a precision sheet metal mech.😆) you couldn't have done it easier and it's fused! Great fix, Ivan! 👍

Nope constant power needs to be cut 👍

I'm 79 and don't recognize anything after the 60s.

Interesting concept as I stare at my ceiling.

Might find a different year with the same calendar days and fix all of it except the actual year number.? With the exception of leap years I believe numbers and days repeat roughly every 6 to 14 years.?

0.2 amps, times 12 volts equals 2.4 watts draw. The multi display is not visibly ON. My guess is this is some mechanical thing inside the radio, perhaps a CD stuck inside, always spinning. The mechanic said that he heard the radio doing something at one point. Put a switch on the power line to the radio, or replace the radio. The guy did good problem solving, he just had to go one more step and cut the power wire to the radio to isolate the problem.

@@markwadkins7758 That was my solution, did the same on a GPS. Who cares what year it is as long as the day is right. As I'm retired, I don't, I have a phone for that.

@@dizzy2020 yes correct my switch got the 130 down to 50ma which is normal. But it could go 2-3 weeks in FL @130 but battery would be done in a year from to many hard charge cycles.

I escaped down South today lol

I think you are right in many cases. In this case, I don't see a problem. Worse case scenario the module that won't go to sleep, goes bad from constant hard resets and you lose gauges and the info screen. The car will still start and run.

@@_RiseAgainst very true. The vehicle will still run. My thing is, why cause a possible deeper issue with something that already is causing an issue, possibly…? Plus, he doesn’t know if it really is the display unit. Yeah the radio fuse was pulled, but the display still powers up. The cluster still powers up. Only thing that is off is the radio. You are supposed to test everything on that circuit. The multi display could be fine, and the radio function/changer/amp could be staying awake from a shutdown fault with one of the components. Process of elimination with very easy confirmation, he could have pulled the radio, pulled the plug on the radio, and/or pulled the amp power plug, and did the test again one by one, to make fully sure it’s the display and not the radio or something with one of the radio components. Pulling the radio is simple in those cars. Less then 15m. That wouldn’t have been much more time and the customer would be in a safe place to know what component/components to be on the look out for. This is incomplete t-shooting. Ivan knows better then that. The Santa Fe should have been his lesson.

@@mikehonda7934 I did prove that it wasn't the radio or amp... If you were paying attention to the logic 😉

@@PineHollowAutoDiagnostics no you didn’t. You pulled the radio fuse and it stopped the draw. The display still powers up, only without memory and the radio. How can you say it’s not the radio or something else with confidence, without completely eliminating the radio from the circuit? Obviously the radio and the display share the memory circuit, but only thing you did was kill constant power to two devices on the same circuit. You didn’t eliminate the radio from the issue, you only disabled constant power/memory from both devices at the same time. I get where you were going with it, but to be sure it’s not the radio, it would have been easier to unplug the radio and keep the memory function active then pull the multi display, like you mentioned. I know, it’s a pain in the cheeks to pull the display. Toyota radios fail in the way you showed in the video in abundance with those CD changers. I’ve put plenty of aftermarket radios in them because of the radio changer intermittently not shutting down causing the same draw. Not saying you’re wrong, just saying you could have made a sure answer a lot easier then you thought.

@@mikehonda7934 watch the video again! There was no draw after turning on the radio in ACC position. IT'S NOT THE RADIO! 😅

@T.J. Kong Yes, you could use a MOSFET. You could also just use a typical automotive Relay, if it were necessary. There are issues with each method, such as size, protecting Leads, etc. First step, I think, would be to measure the current under maximum load and see if a solution like either of these, or some other, would be needed. The Ignition Switch ACC may be able to supply the maximum real load and thus neither of these would be necessary.

Additional practical current is well under 10 amps, and only if you're blasting the music with the amp doing work 🙂

@@PineHollowAutoDiagnostics That is good, and I am not at all surprised, as my last statement above (to @T.J.Kong) stated (last sentence). My overall statement was meant to be a general statement that the additional current added to something, like the Ignition Switch ACC contacts, should be considered. Looks like you did just that. Great job, and thanks for your reply.

@A. Melbs First, I would like to say i would be glad to try and answer your two (2) questions. I do not, however, want to tie up Ivan's channel with this side subject. Also, the best solution to any problem is to find and fix, or if a component is bad replace, the issue/component to eliminate the root cause of the issue. Finding the root cause and fixing it is always the best solution, but is not always a prudent solution, usually due to cost. The root cause of this issue is still present. Depending on what exactly is the cause (such as silver migration on the back of the Cluster which will keep expanding, due to Lead Free Solder), it may get worse and cause other issues, or it may not. We do not know. I am not saying this is the root cause, it is only an example (mostly on GM's I think), and who ever makes the Cluster for Toyota may not have this particular issue as they may have mitigated it by modifying their soldering profile for the Cluster PCB. The root cause could also be something else, and could be in the digital portion of the Multi-Function Display. Again, we do not know what exactly the root cause is, or it's affects, if any, in the future. Note: For more information on silver migration, see Eric O's channel " South Main Auto Repair LLC", who is an exceptional diagnostician, mechanic with decades of experience, who is also very good at making videos. Search for video - "Chevrolet Truck - Battery Dies Overnight - Part II". I would suggest you watch Part 1 as well. He has made a comment to this video just below ours. Question1: In automobiles I would say that a standard automotive relay be used. A place where it would physically fit would have to be found, and at least 4 wires would have to be run, with a fuse in at least one of them. These relays are pretty small and are used all over automobiles both outside under the hood and elsewhere as well as inside. The extra load added would be only in the mAs area with this solution, so should not be an issue. This is the big advantage of relays. They use a small amount of current to control a separate much larger current draw. Question2: Without knowing exactly what you want to do, it is difficult to answer this question. I would look for a unused fuse, or unused contacts on the Ignition Switch for example (if any), something along those lines for your power in. If using a relay, the load on the control side is very low, so using an existing circuit may not be an issue provided you connect to it properly. You do not want to just twist the wires together, but rather use appropriate connectors and solder connections wherever possible, using heat shrink. Depending on what exactly you are doing, there could be many things to consider, load, how it may affect existing circuits, heat, if outside elements (weather), and others, etc. If you are designing circuits then you would use the "theoretical maximum" for your design (data sheet working maximums), but in cases like this measuring or calculating the actual maximum load and adding some margin (say 10-15%) would probably be acceptable. I hope this response to your questions are helpful.

Surely fuses in line are not additive. 45 + 15 does not equal a max load of 60. A chain is as strong as it's weakest link. The 45A fuse will still blow at 45A, regardless of what size fuse you put further down the line.

Wouldn't work if it's parked in a dark garage lol

@@PineHollowAutoDiagnostics True. I wonder how much a small night light style bulb over the back of the car would charge? Probably not enough I guess. I wonder if the clients garage doors have a window?